Showing posts with label quail egg. Show all posts
Showing posts with label quail egg. Show all posts

Wednesday, 25 May 2016

Couple of Ideas

Bought sea caught Grey Mullet, which needs a bit of care to bring it to life. Cooked it whole, gutted and descaled, stuffed the belly with ginger slices, a few chilli slices and the green heads of spring onions. Laid it on oiled and seasoned greaseproof paper that I scattered with a generous handful of refreshed wasabi (seaweed). Wrapped it up papillote style and cooked in a fan oven at 180°C for 40mins. turning it over 2/3rd of cooking time.
 
 Took the skin off, lifted the fillet off the bone and served with some of the cooking juices,

 

Was not the outstanding success expected, cooked just a little too long, still moist but I think cooking could be reduced by 10mins. Wasabe didn't have the impact expected so would probably not repeat. Definitely step up the ginger and chilli to give a bigger kick. Any suggestions welcomed!

To go with it, and to use an abundance of spinach I had at the moment,  I washed, stripped the stalks, spun dry and shredded about 1lb of spinach. Threw that into a very hot pan with a knob of butter and kept stirring to avoid catching and to drive off any lingering water. As it wilted and largely collapsed I then threw the retained ends of two bunches of spring onion which had been sliced along the length into slivers, think julienne but not so fussy.
 
Job done, time to serve, topping the spinach with a warmed soft boiled quails egg. Tasted good even if not outstanding!

I even remembered to take a photo!


Thursday, 7 March 2013

Spinach Cheese

Chanced on this very good combination, excellent for a starter. Yet again no photo, when will I learn?
It is very fast, so get everything ready before starting. Watchpoints: onion en-dente, dry spinach and do not leave the cheese to heat.

Take about 200gm pre-spring-water washed young spinach leaves. Pick over, nip off any thick stems, discard any spoilt leaves. Grab into one tight bundle and cut across in 1/2inch strips, do not worry if the odd leaf escapes. 

Pre-heat a large and deep covered pan. Medium chop one large white onion, so you have strips say about 5mm x 20mm. Coarsely grated about 2oz of Gruyère cheese. Cut two thick slices of a very good wholemeal loaf, crusts off, toast and set aside to keep warm.

Into the pre-heated pan, a smear of oil, throw in onion, cover over a low heat and watch. No colouring, just turning transparent, test, until soft to bite but still retains crispness. Turn pan to highest heat, off with lid, get the chopped spinach in as soon as possible, turning over with spatula, blend with the onion, as soon as the dry spinach wilts, loses it shape, (it should not throw off any water if the spinach is dry and has not been washed again) take off the heat. Strew with Gruyère, keep turning and let the residual heat of the spinach melt the cheese.

In the meantime soft boil and shell two quail eggs!
Serve immediately on the brown toast, a pile of spinach cheese all topped off with a soft boiled quails egg. Yummy